The dream, now more than 40
years old, of constructing a radically different telescope has been
realized by the innovative AMANDA-II project. Instead of sensing light,
like all telescopes since the time of Galileo, AMANDA responds to
a fundamental particle called a neutrino. Neutrino messengers provide
a startlingly new view of the Universe.

Members of the AMANDA team designed
the first practical implementation of the generic ideas formulated
many years ago, and re-introduced in late 80's with the twist
of using Antarctic ice instead of water. Due to the remoteness
of the site in Antarctica, we decided to minimize complexity
of the design while recognizing that the simplest devices and
system architectures were sufficient to answer the key questions.
This concept proved highly effective. AMANDA is now an international
collaboration involving institutions from the US, Germany, Sweden,
Belgium, and Venezuela.